Lactoids

Esther’s breasts
they droop before her, sandbags
counteracting the weight of the theater
curtains: her plaid button-down shirt.

Chantal’s boobs
she doesn’t remember when they emerged
when she realized something was different,
and she was no longer just one of the boys.

Kelly’s girls
when she’s in the club, they get in the way;
but she wouldn’t have a dance
partner – or a drink – without their assistance.

Rebecca’s hooters
they’re her tools, her props;
the job doesn’t get done by the flat-chested,
and even a working girl has to eat.

Laura’s mammaries
the baby cries and she thinks
not of his relief from hunger, but of her own
release from the extra foreign milk-weight.

(Mary’s breasts
the site at which milk,
in the female mammal,
is kept and created for offspring.)